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More Than 200,000 a Day Now Cycling, Data Suggests

By J. David Goodman April 26, 2010 5:05 amApril 26, 2010 5:05 am

J. David Goodman/The New York TimesTwo in 236,000, riding through Chelsea last fall.

Build it and they will ride. That’s the message conveyed in the latest annual estimate of the number of bicyclists in New York City by Transportation Alternatives, which found roughly 236,000 New Yorkers riding each day in 2009, up 28 percent from 185,000 daily riders the year before.

“More and better designed bike lanes, that’s clearly what’s fueling this growth,” said Wiley Norvell, a spokesman for the bicycling and pedestrian advocacy group, which has conducted an annual cycling estimate for nearly two decades.

The estimate was extrapolated from cyclist counts performed by the city Department of Transportation at various downtown entry points — including East River bridge crossings, the Hudson Greenway and the Staten Island Ferry.

Total miles traveled by bike in the city also rose by about the same amount, to 1.8 million miles from 1.4 million miles, according to the estimate, with the vast majority of those miles traveled by commuters or recreational cyclists.

While the count also includes commercial riders such as bike messengers and food-delivery cyclists, Transportation Alternatives calculates that such riders travel only about 5 percent of the total miles, with non-commercial riders making up 95 percent of bike traffic on city streets.

“At this point, this is a legitimate and measurable part of the transportation picture,” said Mr. Norvell, “and with transit cuts and traffic congestion, bicycling is the only part of the transportation picture that has a positive outlook.”

Indeed, the Department of Transportation is looking to double-down on the hundreds of miles of existing bicycle infrastructure, installing more permanent, separated bicycle lanes on major thoroughfares over the next year.

With more than 200,000 cyclists now rolling around, New York has more daily riders than any other city in the country, Mr. Norvell said, though he admits that this has been the case for several years, owing to New York’s greater size. “Chicago, which is a great cycling town, would need 10 percent of its commuters on bikes to reach these numbers,” he said. “But the rapid growth in New York has moved us out into the front of the pack.”

Charles Komanoff, a policy analyst and a former president of Transportation Alternatives, performed the cycling estimate, as he has since 1992.

“The screenline number is as good a number as I think we have,” he said, “even if it probably overstates the increase in overall cycling,” because it focuses on East River crossings and the Hudson River Greenway, both popular cycling routes that have seen sharp increases in riders.

But, he added, the trend is clear.

“I think it’s kind of amazing,” Mr. Komanoff said, comparing the number of riders now to the 1980s. “I think it is now legitimate to refer to cycling as a mainstream mode of travel. And to me, that is a profound development.”

Great news. Now, Mayor Bloomberg and the NYC Council should encourage more bikers to use their bikes and create more bike lanes. Also, Mayor Bloomberg and the NYC Cpuncil needs to improve the safety for bikers by enforcing lane restrictions keeping automobiles from double parking, driving in bike lanes, etc, by stepping up the issuance of fines and making it a moving vehicle violation to drive in the bike lanes. Michael Zullo, Upper Eastside, Manhattan.

A way all New York City bicyclists can greatly improve bicycling conditions both in New York City & New York State is to have their NYS legislators (Assemblymembers & NYS Senators) support three bills now before the Assembly and NYS Senate. The bicyclists as well as other residents interested in improving the quality of life in NYC & NYS must correspond in writing (via a USPS mailed letter/postcard), faxing, emailing and telephoning their NYS Assemblymenber and NYS Senator.

The bills, Complete Streets is being discussed tomorrow in the Assembly Transportation Committee therefore it is of utmost importance to correspond with Assemblyman Gantt & your Assemblyperson today, Monday, April 26, 2010.

1. The NYS Assembly’s Complete Streets bill A8587 is in the Assembly Transportation Committee and must be reported out of the Committee for a full vote by the Assembly. Bicyclists can speed this legislative process up by faxing (518-455-5419), emailing (ganttd@assembly.state.ny.us), and telephoning (518-455-5606) Assemblyman Gantt’s (Chair, Transportation Committee) Albany office by Monday or Tuesday morning, April 26 & 27, before the Committee meets on Tuesday. You must request Assemblyman Gantt and the Committee to favorably report out Bill A8587 Complete Streets for a vote by the entire Assembly. As a public official Chairman Gantt’s public office correspondence information can be noted in this comment.

It is crucial for the success of this bill, which codifies the haphazard existing planning process of including or not including bicyclists’, pedestrians’, & disabled individuals’ needs when planning, designing, and developing transportation (roads, bridges, public transit, etc.) facilities. Without this codification transportation planners, designers, and developers can simply ignore the needs of bicyclists, pedestrians, and disabled individuals in favor of motorized vehicles. As a codification of existing transportation planning, design, and development practices no NYS funds need to be expended when the Complete Streets bills become law. The NYS (& NYC) Department of Transportation has no objection to the passage of the Complete Streets bills and eventually being signed into law by the Governor.

After contacting Assemblyman Gantt’s office please email AND fax a copy of your communication to Mr. Gantt & the Assembly Transportation Committee to Mr. Ferris, Legislative Chair at the AARP’s Albany Office. The AARP is working with & coordinating the efforts of the New York Bicycling Coalition, NYC’s Transportation Alternatives, the Sierra Club, Adirondack Mt. Club, and many other organizations to pass the Complete Streets bills into law. I do not have the AARP’s written permission to list their fax, email, etc. numbers you will have to make the effort to search and find the AARP’s NYC & Albany offices to communicate your bicycling/pedestrian/disabled person advocacy efforts for the Complete Streets bills.

When the Federal Complete Streets bills become law (hopefully this year) the State will be able to instantly qualify for Federal Funds because the NYS Complete Streets law is in place.

2. The Complete Streets bill S5711 sponsored by Dilan and Diaz (NYC NYS Senators) has been reported out of the Senate Transportation committee for a full vote by the NYS Senate. Thank these two Senators and ask your NYS Senator to vote FOR this bill.

3. Vulnerable Road Users Bills: Assembly bill A7917 and NYS Senate bill S5292, sponsored by Assemblyman Kavanagh and Senator Squadron both of NYC. These two bills are stuck in committee and need to be reported out for a vote by the entire Assembly & Senate. Email, write & mail, fax, telephone the Assembly & NYS Senate transportation committees, legislators Kavanagh & Squadron as well as your Assemblymember & NYS Senator to have both these bills passed by their respective houses of the NYS legislature. These Vulnerable Road user bills A7917 & S5292 specify the conditions and penalties of a motorist’s “requirement of exercising due care in the operation of a motor vehicle to avoid colliding with any bicyclist, pedestrian or domestic animal.”

After you email, fax, write, & telephone your legislators you must email the New York Bicycling Coalition (nybc@nybc.net) to tell the Coalition’s Legislative Chair of your wonderful bicycling advocacy activities. We thank you for your advocacy activities.

In the interests of full disclosure, the writer of this comment is a member of the Board of Directors, New York Bicycling Coalition. He writes bicycle tour guide books; is active in the general NYS tourism business community; bicycles about 6000 miles a year; and will be in NYC at the “NY by Rail” travel exhibition in Penn Station on Wednesday, May 12, 2010, to freely answer your NYS bicycling questions and give you a free NYS Bike Route map.

More bicyclists is not an improvement to the overall transportation picture if those people used to be public transit users, only if they used to be drivers. How does it help to get people out of the subway and on to the roads?

No one wants to talk about the numbers of pedestrians and bus riders at the mercy of many arrogant bike riders who think the run the world — and the streets.
And next Sunday’s 5-boro bike event, while nice for a few bike riders, will once again totally inconvenience real people who actually use buses and have to get to work, school, their house of worship, etc., all so Princess Sadik-Khan can take all the credit for making NYC so bike-friendly and more frustrating for bus riders…

How can anyone believe that statistic? Is anyone seeing cycling volumes approachintg these purported numbers? If the NYT can’t independently verify this figure, they should treat this group’s claims with extreme skepticism.

Exactly #2 AN, I don’t think that it’s a coincidence that in today”s paper the MTA is reporting significant drops in ridership. Has anyone seen how Subway and Bus line ridership along areas with new Bike Lanes is faring? I know I walk more since a monthly unlimited ride Metrocard doesn’t make sense for me, nor does spending the money on short infrequent trips. But at close to $100/month a bicycle pays for itself pretty quickly, and that doesn’t factor in the health benefits and sheer joy of the ride! RIDE ON!

Good !! And I’m sure the numbers will grow, just as they are in other cities all over this country and the world.

Now if we could only get the Mayor and the NYPD to address the problem of the hundreds of food delivery cyclists that one sees flouting traffic laws every day, instead of spending millions a year harassing the monthly Critical Mass ride.

While this is good news — the unfortunate fact remains that cycling as a viable commuter option still ranks very low on the NYC DOT’s priority list.

The motorized vehicle bias of that Department is deeply-entrenched. To the DOT the only thing that really matters is providing roadways for cars, trucks and buses etc. For far too long the DOT has regularly fought initatives to improve cycling as a safe commuting option and even today only grudgingly follows the lead of others in striping bike lanes.

As time and weather take their toll, it will be crucial that the recently demarcated bike lanes be maintained as the striping etc. wears off. I will not be so foolish as to hold my breath waiting for the City’s DOT to keep these bike lane markings in good repair — much less improve and extend the lanes so as to encourage even more cycling commuters.

Until there is a sea change of thinking (i.e. a “greening”) in the culture of NYC’s DOT – I fear cyclists in this city will always be fighting an uphill battle to gain equitable street access and safe riding conditions.

Well George, since motor vehicles are taxed on registration, taxed additionally for parking above the sales tax rate, tolled, taxed on fuel, taxed on oil and tire recycling, ticketed for rightful violations at punishing rates, I would say that’s not a bias, but a revenue stream.

I commute ten miles a day from Wash Hgts to where I work at Fifth Ave and E.104th St – so people who commute within uptown or those who commute within their own outer boroughs are completely excluded from this count? Sounds this survey could be undercounting by the tens of thousands.

I invite the Mayor and City Council to get their butts on a bike and ride around in bike lanes in Brooklyn, so they can experience the potholes – no, craters – in many of the bike lanes and roads. Also so they can enjoy the heart-pounding rush that those of us who try to ride through the park every morning feel as we try to stay in the designated bike lane (often occupied by runners and walkers) while cars drive as if they’re on the BQE through the park in the morning and evening. I love riding my bike, and I’m really happy to see these numbers and reports – it’s truly a great thing. And I’ve had too many scary experiences (and one horrible accident) because of poor lighting on shoddy roads, sinkholes, drivers not paying any attention to sharing the road. We can do even better!

Something else to consider: for every car taken off the road, there will be less toll money collected by MTA Bridges and Tunnels (Triboro, Verrazano, Battery Tunnel, etc), much of which goes toward subway and bus upkeep. True, cars do take a “toll” on roads and bridges, but they also help keep subways in good repair by supplementing the MTA’s income. The MTA takes in far more then it spends on bridge/tunnel maintenance and salaries.

If there are that many bikes on the roads, then it’s time to have the DMV license the bike riders and have them register their bikes. If they use the roads, they have to pay the user fees like everybody else. If there are even more bikes on the roads, then it’s probably time to require the bike riders to carry collision insurance and health insurance.

And if I hear another jackass say that the DMV is not the appropriate agency because of the letter “M”, I’ll say that this can be easily corrected by renaming “DMV” as “DV”

Princess Sadik-Khan! Perfect. It fits perfectly with King Bloomberg. Building a fairy tale mid-town Manhattan for tourists.
200K bikers per day, I doubt it. Not even in the peak summer months.How many is it it in February? I guess that doesn’t matter. All that matters is that riding a bicycle is less wasteful than a car so cyclists so they can be a righteous as they want.
Enough with the car and truck hating already. Without them this city stops functioning. And if you are too scared to ride a bike without a bike lane, maybe you shouldn’t be commuting by bike.

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